“Cannot they, indeed? Lord, my good woman, you little know the playgoers. You think that they are so nice in their discrimination? You should have learnt better since the days you hung on to Madame Violanti's feet on the tight rope. If you had wriggled so that Violanti had slipped off her rope, would her patrons have blamed aught but her? Nay, you know that they would only have sneered at her clumsiness, and thought nothing of the little devil who had upset her.” “Ay; I begin to perceive your meaning. You apprehend that the playgoers will damn the play and all associated with it, because Miss Hoppner does not kill me with sufficient good-will?” “I feel sure that they will say that if Mrs. Woffington had only acted with sufficient intensity she would have stirred her rival into so real a passion of jealousy that she would have stabbed you in a fury.” “Look you here, friend Davy; if it be in your thoughts that Mairgaret Woffington is to be held accountable for the mistakes of all the other members of your company, you would do well to revise your salary list.” “Nay, Peggy; I only said what the playgoers will, in their error, mind you, assume.” “Come, Mr. Garrick, tell me plainly what you want me to do for you in this business. What, sir, are we not on sufficiently friendly terms for plain speaking? Tell me all that is on your mind, sir?” Garrick paused for some moments, and then laughed in a somewhat constrained way, before walking on by the side of his friend. “Come, sir,” continued Mrs. Woffington. “Be as plain as you please. I am not prone to take offence.” “We'll talk of that anon,” said Garrick. “Perhaps Mr. Macklin will be able to give us his helpful counsel in this business.” “Psha!” said Peggy. “Mr. Macklin could never be brought to see with your eyes.” “Then he will be all the better able to give us the result of Mr. Macklin's observation,” said Garrick. “Ay, but that is not what you want, Davy,” said Mrs. Woffington, with a pretty loud laugh. “No one ever calls in a counsellor with the hope of obtaining an unprejudiced opinion; the only counsellor in whom we have confidence is he who corroborates our own views.” II They had reached their house. It was No. 6 Bow Street, and it was presided over by Macklin--Garrick and Mrs. Woffington doing the housekeeping on alternate months. Visitors preferred calling during Peggy's month, as the visitor, who was now greeted by David Garrick in the parlour, testified in the presence of his biographer years after; for it was Samuel Johnson who awaited the return from rehearsal of his Lichfield pupil, David Garrick. “You shall have a dish of tea, Mr. Johnson, if we have to go thirsty for the rest of the week,” cried the actress, when her hand had been kissed by her visitor. Johnson's kissing of her hand was strangely suggestive of an elephant's picking up a pin.